The United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), a UN aid agency for Palestinians shrouded in controversy, may be preparing to close for good, the New York Times reported on Thursday, citing UN officials.
The agency, which works throughout the Middle East, has been embroiled in controversy after it was discovered that several of its workers participated in Hamas’s October 7 massacre in 2023. Since Hamas’s murder of 1200 people and the resulting war, the IDF has highlighted that numerous UNRWA employees hold second jobs as Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad terrorists.
Stemming from the growing concern over UNRWA’s role in Hamas, the Israeli government voted to ban the UN agency from operating on Israeli soil - a decision which officials say may have closed the shutters on UNRWA permanently. The ban is set to come into place this month.
UNRWA employees told the Times that communication with Israel is essential to ensure that aid can be safely delivered in Gaza and parts of the West Bank.
Cut-off cooperation endangers staff
“If we can’t share that information with Israeli authorities on a daily basis,” said Louise Wateridge, a senior UNRWA official on the ground in Gaza, “then we have staff lives in danger.”
Wateridge claimed that 250 UNRWA workers have been killed since the outbreak of the war, although it is unclear if she included in her figure those also employed by Hamas and PIJ.
Other officials complained to the Times that Israel had prevented the agency’s workers from entering northern Gaza in recent weeks - where IDF forces have been battling against Hamas’s terrorists.
Additionally, officials said that the agency had halted aid deliveries in the southern Gaza Strip as a result of looting.